subs. (old).—Influenza, the FLUE (q.v.): see quot.
1420. [SIR H. MAXWELL, Notes and Queries, 10 Dec. 1901]. It is well known that the influenza is not an exclusively modern complaint, but I am not sure whether a curious reference to it by Bower, the continuator of Fordun’s chronicle, has been noted. Writing of the year 1420 he says that among those who died in Scotland were Sir Henry St. Clair, Earl of Orkney, Sir James Douglas of Dalkeith, Sir William de Abernethy, Sir William de St. Clair, Sir William Cockburn, and many others, all by ‘that infirmity whereby not only great men, but innumerable quantity of the commonalty perished, which was vulgarly termed le QUHEW.’ Now ‘quh’ in Scottish texts usually represents the sound of ‘wh’ (properly aspirated); therefore it seems that in the fifteenth century the influenza was known as ‘the WHEW,’ just as it is known in the twentieth century as ‘the Flue.’ There seems little doubt that the disease was identical with that with which we are so grievously familiar.
